Rotten apple could destroy the world you knew: Gabe Newell talks.

February 2, 2013

As the name attached to Steam and all its mighty success, Gabe Newell recognizes how powerful Apple has gotten and sees them as a threat to all console kind. If you’re saying to yourself but Steam is a PC thing – you can’t forget about the up and coming Steam Box. Apple has kicked in the door, knocked your trash cans over, and invaded your PC ecosystem. If you’re Apple this is wonderful. If you’re everyone else this can be scary.

The Valve co-founder said:

“The threat right now is that Apple has gained a huge amount of market share, and has a relatively obvious pathway towards entering the living room with their platform. I think that there’s a scenario where we see sort of a dumbed down living room platform emerging — I think Apple rolls the console guys really easily. The question is can we make enough progress in the PC space to establish ourselves there, and also figure out better ways of addressing mobile before Apple takes over the living room?”

This quote comes from an earlier talk with the University of Texas’ LBJ School of Public Affairs. It seems that to Newell there is sort of a space race going on to who dominates the living room scene first – PC developers or Apple? If PC companies do nothing then Apple will march in and take the living room by force. At this point consoles won’t matter, there will only be Apple – even in the console scene.

Ultimately, the Steam Box would bring everything great about PC gaming to the TV screen. Through the already existing Big Picture mode on Steam, the Steam Box would cut out the PC middle man and just work as a solo device using your Steam account. Sounds brilliant to me. With new consoles on the horizon, these will be pressing months for everyone. I have a hunch that E3 will be pull back the curtains on many up and coming questions.